Corruption and Bribery

This paper from the German Marshall Fund of the United States notes Georgia's better performance compared to Ukraine in two key areas of reform: improving the rule of law and battling corruption. The paper says that Ukraine’s failure to capitalize on the hopes raised by the ‘Orange Revolution’ has been highlighted by the recent Nato summit in Riga, where it became plain that plans to fast track Ukraine’s NATO membership application have been shelved indefinitely.

The United States has vocally opposed Sandinista candidate Daniel Ortega, the winner of Nicaragua’s presidential election. But Nicaraguans are more concerned about a political pact that threatens to derail their country’s democratic institutions.

Ray Fisman and Eduard Miguel look at which countries' diplomats at the United Nations rack up the most parking tickets and why. They find two strong determining factors: countries with high measures of official corruption and anti-Americanism are far more likely to amass such tickets.

Former Pentagon official Paul Wolfowitz is now reveling in the role of reformer at the World Bank, where he has made corruption a major theme of his first year as chief. But fighting corruption, like building democracy, may be the work of generations.

A decade after the World Bank mounted its first anticorruption campaign, the impact appears to have been minimal. Paul Wolfowitz, the bank's new president, is seeking to reinvigorate the effort. But doubts remain about the bank's ability to confront corruption among its borrowers.

2015 Annual Report

Learn more about CFR’s mission and its work over the past year in the 2015 Annual Report. The Annual Report spotlights new initiatives, high-profile events, and authoritative scholarship from CFR experts, and includes a message from CFR President Richard N. Haass.Read and download »